and to confer upon them still greater benefits than you receive, and in public affairs you are able to benefit your own state, as a man must who is to be not despised but held in high repute among the many. And yet, Hippias, what in the world is the reason why those men of old whose names are called great in respect to wisdom—Pittacus, and Bias, and the Milesian ThalesPittacus of Mitylene, Bias of Priene, and Thales of Miletus were among the traditional seven wise men. with his followers and also the later ones, down to Anaxagoras, are all,